This 100-grandmaster knockout "world championship" at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas last August was a bust. It lacked star power, attracted few spectators and was widely ignored by the media.

Everyone knows that Garry Kasparov is the real champ. He and Anatoly Karpov boycotted the event; now Karpov is suing FIDE for stripping him of his FIDE title.

Meanwhile, FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the president of Kalmykia (an autonomous Russian province on the Caspian Sea) took a hard line. He nixed any unification match between Khalifman and either of the two Ks.

"If Kasparov or Karpov have any questions, FIDE is happy to invite them to our next World Championship in 2000," he said.

"Dumbing down the world title has long been a goal of the FIDEcrats," said former Chess Life editor Larry Parr. "Too many champs were bigger than the world chess body, so the solution was to destroy their prestige by creating `champions for a day.' If it succeeds, top players no longer will have a strong spokesman or a countervailing center of power."